1. Field of the invention:
The present invention relates to an apparatus for automatically supplying a test medicament into an elution test container containing a test liquid (solvent) for use in elution testing device for measuring elution degree of components of solid medicaments in forms of tablets, granule, capsule and so on when dipping them in the solvent.
2. Description of Prior Art:
Recently, elution test of solid medicaments such as tablets, granules, capsules, etc., has been regarded important as one of medicament quality evaluation methods. Such elution test is carried out to measure elution rate of main medicine of solid medicament when dipping it in various solvents. In such elution test, for example, a solid medicament is first dipped into various solvents each put in a test container and kept at a temperature of 37.degree. C., then a certain quantity of solution is periodically picked up as a sample liquid of which absorbancy is measured with a spectrophotometer one after another, and thus changes of elution quality of main medicine are recorded by time elapse While, to measure several components of a medicament simultaneously, a certain quantity of sample liquid is separately picked up and liquid chromatographic analysis is conducted on them.
In the mentioned method of elution test, a glass container having a semiglobular inner bottom surface with a radius of 50 to 52.5 mm and an open upper end surface and having a capacity of 1,000 ml is employed. 500 to 900 ml of test liquid (solvent) is poured into the test container, then a test medicament is dipped into the test liquid to be dissolved therein. In this method, the step of pouring a test liquid into a test container has been heretofore performed manually.
To avoid such a troublesome manual work, for example, the Japanese Patent Publication (unexamined) No. 63-196859 has disclosed a turntable for supplying sample medicaments into containers one after another from sample holes through sample injection slots. To carry out such supplying operation using the turntable, an upper disc provided with a plurality of sample holes in circumferential direction is coaxially superposed on a lower disc provided with sample injection slots, then the upper disc is rotated with respect to the lower disc so that each sample hole on which sample medicament is placed is moved to the location of a sample injection slot one after another.
However, it is troublesome to supply test medicament manually into a test container and, in particular, those manually worked become further troublesome when number of test containers increases, for example, to six. There is a further possibility of occurring any artificial mistake such as one in weighing. In this respect, it is a recent trend to automatically carry out every process of various tests, and in this sense manual supply of test medicament is undoubtedly a drawback to be overcome in view of full automation.
In the medicament supply apparatus of turntable type as is disclosed in the Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication (unexamined) No. 63-196859, a problem exists in that cleaning of medicament tray part and inner peripheral surface of sample holes is quite troublesome, eventually making it very difficult to perform the entire maintenance. Another problem exists in that it is impossible to supply granular medicament. In case of installing plural test containers, a further problem exists in that a turntable for each test container and plural control mechanisms are required to control each table separately.